The HEAVEN in the HEREAFTER
by etakkate
Summary: Booth promised her that he wouldn't be a hero... does he live up to his promise? A one-shot set between season 5 and 6 with no Hannah, a fair chunk of angst and a happy ending. Rated T for language. Marked as complete but I may add an epilogue if there's interest.


**I don't own Bones**

 **Promise me you'll stick in 'till the end... it's worth it!**

 **...**

Surely I'm dreaming again.

One minute I'm packing up my gear after a year of heat rash, sunburn and sand irritating every conceivable crevasse and fold of my body; and the next minute I'm here in her living room, standing behind her.

Her head is bowed; she's holding something; a piece of paper maybe; I can't see what, and then her shoulders begin to shake, in fact her whole body seems to just. . . _tremble_.

I wonder if she's laughing or crying until a heartbreaking moan breaks free from her body. It's as if it had started in her toes and ripped upward through her body, gathering a roaring momentum and by the time it reached her lips it became a loud heave of guttural agony.

I'm immediately there; my arms – they try to wrap around her to comfort her, to soften the damage of her collapsing legs but she slips right through my grasp, landing with a thump at my feet.

"Bones! Hey. . . Temperance. . . baby. . . what's wrong?"

I talk 'till I'm begging and yet she doesn't respond; she just sobs and, by God I wish I knew what to do or say to her but it's like she's not even registering my presence. It's _killing_ me and I realise that I'm shaking too and my tears are falling silently to join hers on the hardwood floor… I can't stand seeing her like this; I'm desperate to help her but I just can't seem to get through her grief.

It must be her Dad. . . or Russ. After finally making amends with her and sorting their shit out, earning her trust again; watching her re-build her broken soul brick by painful brick; I swear to God Himself, if Max has gone and got himself killed I'll slay the bastard for a second time in the afterlife for breaking Bones' heart again!

The piece of paper she had been holding slips from her lap, I skim over it and my heart drops. . . No, no, it can't be right. . .

 _". . .with deepest sympathy. . . regret to inform you. . . Sergeant Major Seeley Booth. . . killed in action. . ."_

"No! No, Bones! It's wrong! It's _wrong_! I'm right here, baby, I'm right here!"

She scrunches up the paper and angrily throws it only for it to fall weakly onto the rug just two feet in front of her. Tears start anew as she cries into the cavernous space of her living room, "Argh- _Ugh!_ I _hate_ you Seeley Booth! You promised me you wouldn't be a hero!" she sobs, "You. . . you _promised_!"

"I wasn't Bones, I wasn't. This is all wrong."

"This is all wrong!" her voice is raw and hiccupping, "You were meant to come back and meet me at the coffee cart. . . and we'd have coffee. . . and you'd say you _missed_ me and then you'd. . . we'd. . . you'd show me what it meant to _make love_ and. . . and it would all be OK but _better_."

I'm dumfounded, "You love me?"

He head falls into her hands and she weeps around surging, barking whispers, "Because I _love_ you."

I rub my hand over her back in a vain attempt to sooth her, "I love you too Bones, you've gotta believe me I do."

She continues: a halting, whimpering stream of frantic conscious thought, "I wish I'd said 'yes' even though. . . even though I _can't_ change to be the person you needed. . ."

"I never said I wanted you to change Bones, I love you just the way you are."

"And we were worth more than a _gamble_ , Booth! More than. . . more than an impulsive peer-pressured proposal. . . I couldn't risk. . . Oh God, I couldn't lose you." She broke down anew, "And I. . . I. . . I lost you!"

I try to hug her but she's rigid, closed off and shaking, "Temperance, please hear me, please! I'm sorry! I love you; you _know_ I love you."

She lifted her head and again shouted to the room, "You never said you loved me God-dammit! You never said. . . except in a, in an _atta-girl_ way, whatever the hell _that's_ supposed to mean! You just wanted to gamble our friendship on unsubstantiated, goaded compulsion. . . and then when I didn't agree. . . when I couldn't agree to risk what we had you. . . you moved on! What man in _love_ would have moved on so quickly?"

I scruff a hand over my face and realise, once again that my eyes are wet with tears. I'm dying here! Or more to the point, I'm already _dead_ apparently! What sick, fucked up reality is this?

A pounding noise echo's through her apartment. It takes a moment for either of us to register that it's someone at the door. Then we hear it again followed by a muffled male voice, "Tempe, Temperance, I know you're in there, open up."

Sully? It can't be! Last I heard he was living the dream sailing the seven seas riding the Temperance. . . talk about Freudian slip. . . the sick bastard!

Bones sniffs and wipes the tears from her red-splotched face and from somewhere I hear a droning hum like a swarm of bees. I look around and find nothing out of place.

"Tempe, open up, _please_."

She stands and runs her palms down her skirt to dry them. Opening the door (without checking the peep hole!), she's instantly wrapped into the arms of her former lover and I grind my jaw with jealousy because she actually registers _his_ touch. She wraps her arms around his neck God-dammit, and he lifts her off the ground so that there's room for him to step forward into her apartment and shut the door behind him with his foot.

The humming sound grows louder and I swear it must be my blood pressure rising; my ear drums vibrating; white hot rage threatening to split them open at the seams any second now with the steaming anger that's burning at the sight of _my_ Bones in _his_ arms.

"It's OK Tempe, It's OK. I'm here now. I promise I'll never leave you like he did." He sooths and she buries her head into his neck and, Dear Lord I'm not sure how long I can hold myself back from beating him into a bloody, miserable pulp!

He lifts his head to stare straight at me over her shoulder and his eyes are glowing charcoal and red like the burning ash end of a lit cigar. The humming sound intensifies and he growls over an unnaturally reverberating snarl, "You left her, sir. You made Tempe a promise and you broke it, sir. . . sir. . ."

…

"Sir, sir!" the male flight attendant shakes me and I blink up at him; the droning hum of the engines are now fully flooding my conscious, "You need to fasten your seat belt, sir, we're preparing our descent into Dulles airport."

Disoriented, I spring up, scrubbing at the grit in my eyes and the dried slaver from the side of my mouth. My guts drop and twist at the memories of my dream. . . it _was_ a dream; just a different variant of the same damn, God-awful dream I've had almost every night of this hell hole of a year!

…

I'm too anxious to go home and change and so in full uniform, in the dimming stippled light of dusk, with my rucksack beside me, I sit on the steps in front of the coffee cart; unable to calm my restlessly bouncing leg.

I can feel her presence before I see it; even after a year apart and only a few brief emails we still have our connection. I turn to take her in and, God, I'd almost forgotten the dazzling wonder she's bleeds. . . she wears life and light like a halo and the heat of if it sends a thrill through my body.

The warmth of her open smile hits me with an energizing punch to the chest and I honestly don't think I've smiled at all in the last 12 months, at least not in the way that I'm grinning like a right fool at her right now.

I breach the distance between us in two striding steps and pull her into my arms, lifting her off the ground in the way that Sully had in my dream. . . only this is reality – _my_ reality and. . . Dear Sweet Jesus; _Bones. . . you smell so good!_

She laughs in my arms and it's happy and heavenly like church bells, "Booth!"

I hum into her neck and she shivers in response, the angst of my dream bolstering my resolve, "Oh, Bones, I missed you so much."

She melts into my arms and I hear her sigh – in relief, pleasure, happiness? I can't be sure until I feel the sweet tingle of her lips at my throat. It's just the softest of grazes but surely I'm not imagining it. I decide to test the waters with a lingering kiss to the curve of her jawline and the break-out of goose-bumps along the surface of her arms prompts me to lower my head and run my tongue experimentally along her clavicle, punctuating it with a sucking kiss to the base of her throat.

The most incredible sound escapes her – like a cross between a gasp and a whimper and I can't help but smile against the soft skin of her neck.

"Mmm, Booth, I missed you too."

I shake my head, nuzzled in the crook of her neck, "I don't think you understand, Bones, I really, _really_ missed you." I follow that up with a series of wet kisses across her shoulder, just in case she wondered in what context I had really, _really_ missed her.

Her voice is thick with pleasure, "So I take it you haven't moved on?"

I shake my head in answer and whisper intently beneath her ear, "I have no idea why I thought I could move on from you Bones. You're _it_ for me and I'm sorry it took 3,000 miles, a million crazy-arsed nightmares and a whole God-damn year for me to realise that. I honest to God love you Temperance and I'll wait forever for you to be ready if that's what you need."

She pulls her head back slightly but not far enough away that I can't touch my nose to hers; her smile scorches me from the inside out, "I don't need forever, Booth."

With what I hope is a charming smile, I nudge her nose with mine affectionately, urging her to continue, "No?"

"No. . . I. . ."

I notice a tear tumble from her eyes and I swipe at it with my thumb, concern dimming my confidence. It must have been written across my face because she begins to laugh, running her fingers under her eyes to clear the tears and she sniffs, "I'm sorry. . . I'm. . . I'm _happy_ , Booth. I imagined I would have had to fight for you to give us another chance and I'm just surprised is all."

She reaches a hand up to my face and holds it there tenderly, "I apologise for worrying you. I imagine that my lacrimation is simply a cerebral response to the surge of adrenaline, dopamine and serotonin due to your. . ." her eyes drop with uncertainty, "well, it's the first time you've said you love me with no caveats attached."

"What do you mean 'no caveats attached'?"

"You know. . . no 'atta-girl'?"

I shake my head and look down; embarrassed, "I was a coward, Bones. I'm sorry."

Her thumb nail drags teasingly over my stubble; I wish I'd taken the time to shave for her.

"It's fine, Booth, I was too."

She looks at me through her lashes and. . . By God, I'm soo gonna kiss her!

I didn't think any further than a confession of my love. . . I didn't expect that she was going to agree but I'll be damned if that's gonna stop me taking her and never letting go.

I lean in and steal her lips with mine; the wind rushes out of me and, God I feel like a scrawny, green teenager kissing a Goddess from the heavens. Her lips are warm and plump and hungry over mine; her hand slips from my face to my hair and she fists it tightly in her precious paws in order to pull my mouth deeper and harder against hers for lashings and lashings of bliss.

We breathe the same plot of air in gasping breaths and her lips that are touching but no longer drawing at mine lift at the edges to form an intoxicated smile. Her sapphire eyes are lidded with the perfect combination of love and lust and I swear on my grandma's grave that I've never seen nor dreamt of anything more beautiful.

And then she says it, and I have to pinch myself to prove that this isn't just another one of the million damn nightmares I've had about Doctor Temperance Brennan over the last 12 months before waking up in a sweating, feverish mess every God-damn night.

She pulls me closer so that I swear she can feel evidence of my excitement through our clothing and welcomes me home, "I. . . I love you too, Booth."

...

 **OK, I realise that it's the most overworked, cliché adaptation of the unreliable narrator but it was just clawing for release…**

 **This is my first attempt at first person and I'm not really good with Booth's voice but maybe, if you were interested, maybe I could do one more chapter from Brennan's POV.**

 **If I were to do this then there would surely be a rating change! *wink wink***


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